A Condor Free Weekend Update
Let's start with Saturday - met up with a couple of friends and we went mountain biking at Wilder Ranch, just north of Santa Cruz.
We had a fun time despite Jason's gears getting out of whack and Danny's shock blowing a seal near the end of the ride.
In this first photo, there are actually real people, and one of them is even me - how amazing is that in one of my blog posts!
Here Jason and I commiserate on the state of his bike's gears - we're at the bottom of the Enchanted Loop - a great piece of single track that drops down over lots of Redwood tree roots to the bottom (where the photo was taken) before emerging up a short-ish rather steep ride back to the start of the loop.
Overall, we did a 12 mile ride over various trails and loops in Wilder Ranch.
As has been a trend on recent mountain bike rides, we came across a snake at one stage - though this one was tiny.
In the photo below, you can see Danny and Jason and the snake (clue, look at the two holes in the trail in the bottom left of the photo - the snake is poking out of the right hand side hole).
On to Sunday! The last couple of weeks have seen the traditional summer weather pattern in the extreme - lots of fog and morning drizzle. I've ended up using my wiper blades in the car every time I've driven to San Jose the last two weeks.
This kind of weather, combined with it being the height of tourist season and folks such a Gateau visiting recently means that the Ducati has been sitting the garage.
However, today, the fog burned back off the shore enough that weather wise, the time was right for a blast. Tourist traffic of course is just bound to be bad, but I knew that before I headed out.
It was a good blast, and although Highway 1 was pretty full with tourists, most of the few times I found some clear road happened to be where the road was fun.
Soon after I left town I noticed smoke in the sky, which means that there's a wildfire somewhere.
In the photo below, taken at my turn around point, you can see the smoke.
One interesting note about the turnaround point. I normally grab a bottle of water and some sort of candy bar (typically a Mounds - which is basically a Bounty Bar in English English - or today's choice, a Twix). The little store there is fairly pricey, but you can't blame them as they're in the middle of nowhere.
However today, the woman behind the till only changed me $2 for both the water and the candy - I pointed out to her that I had both and she repeated the price and noted that I'm frequently there buying stuff on a Sunday and that I should have a nice day. I think she remembered my squeaky boots (the motorcycle boots have all this ankle protection and it all squeaks when I walk).
On the way back up, even though the main fog bank was still a couple of miles off shore, little bits of mist was forming next to the road side, particularly once I got up into the area the Condors tend to habitat. I didn't see any Condors today, but the photo below shows you the general scene, with Highway 1 on the right going north up the Big Sur coastline.
I think it's impossible to not enjoy a motorcycle ride on roads like this.
We had a fun time despite Jason's gears getting out of whack and Danny's shock blowing a seal near the end of the ride.
In this first photo, there are actually real people, and one of them is even me - how amazing is that in one of my blog posts!
Here Jason and I commiserate on the state of his bike's gears - we're at the bottom of the Enchanted Loop - a great piece of single track that drops down over lots of Redwood tree roots to the bottom (where the photo was taken) before emerging up a short-ish rather steep ride back to the start of the loop.
Overall, we did a 12 mile ride over various trails and loops in Wilder Ranch.
As has been a trend on recent mountain bike rides, we came across a snake at one stage - though this one was tiny.
In the photo below, you can see Danny and Jason and the snake (clue, look at the two holes in the trail in the bottom left of the photo - the snake is poking out of the right hand side hole).
On to Sunday! The last couple of weeks have seen the traditional summer weather pattern in the extreme - lots of fog and morning drizzle. I've ended up using my wiper blades in the car every time I've driven to San Jose the last two weeks.
This kind of weather, combined with it being the height of tourist season and folks such a Gateau visiting recently means that the Ducati has been sitting the garage.
However, today, the fog burned back off the shore enough that weather wise, the time was right for a blast. Tourist traffic of course is just bound to be bad, but I knew that before I headed out.
It was a good blast, and although Highway 1 was pretty full with tourists, most of the few times I found some clear road happened to be where the road was fun.
Soon after I left town I noticed smoke in the sky, which means that there's a wildfire somewhere.
In the photo below, taken at my turn around point, you can see the smoke.
One interesting note about the turnaround point. I normally grab a bottle of water and some sort of candy bar (typically a Mounds - which is basically a Bounty Bar in English English - or today's choice, a Twix). The little store there is fairly pricey, but you can't blame them as they're in the middle of nowhere.However today, the woman behind the till only changed me $2 for both the water and the candy - I pointed out to her that I had both and she repeated the price and noted that I'm frequently there buying stuff on a Sunday and that I should have a nice day. I think she remembered my squeaky boots (the motorcycle boots have all this ankle protection and it all squeaks when I walk).
On the way back up, even though the main fog bank was still a couple of miles off shore, little bits of mist was forming next to the road side, particularly once I got up into the area the Condors tend to habitat. I didn't see any Condors today, but the photo below shows you the general scene, with Highway 1 on the right going north up the Big Sur coastline.
I think it's impossible to not enjoy a motorcycle ride on roads like this.
posted by Tim H at 7:55 PM
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